


Competing Destinies

by deborah_judge



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003), due South
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-30
Updated: 2011-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-15 06:15:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/157860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deborah_judge/pseuds/deborah_judge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Colonials and Cylons landed near Chicago as penniless refugees. Leoben offered Stella the case of a lifetime and the chance to fulfil her destiny.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Competing Destinies

"So," Stella said, "Why exactly do you need a lawyer?"

She had an idea. There had been enough cases involving the legality and rights of the aliens known as Cylons ever since they and their human allies had landed near Chicago. The one called Leoben didn't answer immediately, though, but simply gazed at her, looking exasperatingly and infuriatingly like her ex.

"Do you ever wonder," he said, "why God prepared you for this moment?" And it was crazy-making, because he was leaning in way too close and looking at her like he might understand, like he might know about all she went through to be a lawyer, to be the kind of lawyer she was, how it had cost her her parents and the children she never had and most importantly Ray. Leoben moved even closer, slipped around her desk to stand beside her, and she couldn't remember to tell him that, actually, this side of the desk is no place for clients.

"I don't believe in God," she blurted out, because she hadn't, not ever since the priests who taught her to fight for justice were caught diddling altar boys, but Leoben took her hand and put it on his face. She felt the lines on his face, the lines that her marriage with Ray had not lasted long enough for her to feel on him.

"God made this," Leoben said. He smiled softly, like thought he had won something, and it made her want to shove him against the wall and kiss him until his mouth ached. He thought he was made by God to fulfil her fantasies. Perhaps he was. She had always fantasized about taking down an unconstitutional law, and the recent moves to deport the aliens might be exactly that.

"You don't have any money, do you?" she asked. Of course not. She took out a standard contract, made some changes, and handed it to him. "Sign here," she said.

His hand lingered over hers as he reached for the pen. He signed the contract without taking his eyes from hers, then let his hand slide up her arm to come to rest on her shoulder. She stepped into his arms and let him kiss her. He kissed just like Ray, demanding and taking and beautiful, and it was so easy to surrender. She felt the curve of his stomach, the muscles of his chest. And she understood, he had no money so this was what he was offering. She could take it without violating the legal code of ethics, because, after all, aliens had no rights. And she wanted him, wanted this body at least, but damn, it wasn't Leoben she wanted.

She stepped back, out of his arms. "I don't believe in God," she said. "I don't believe God made you for me. And I don't believe in screwing my clients."

"Fine," he said. "I'll be back tomorrow to talk strategy." He was almost out the door when he turned. "But, Stella," he said, "you will."

*

In Stella's dreams Leoben threw her down behind her desk and took her surrounded by papers. In her dreams he was gentle like Ray when he touched her, his fingers sweet and perfect on her clit, his mouth open and loving on her neck, her collarbone, her chest. And he looked at her, always, like he wasn't afraid. Not of her pleasure, not of her strength, not of the way her legs clenched around his waist when she came, not of the fierceness of her knowledge that only this cock fit inside her the way it should.

It was a wonder, Stella thought, twenty-three years with Ray and she had never really understood what his fear looked like until she saw his face without it. Leoben thrust gently, sweetly, not trying to impress her but simply giving her everything he had in the full knowledge that she would joyfully receive it. She wrapped one hand in his hair and traced the other over the lines in his face. He kept his eyes open as he moved inside her. He was hers, she understood, as completely as Ray had never been. He could love everything she was, and take delight in it. She let the pleasure build slowly until her orgasm felt like dawn.

She woke, shuddering and wet, and got her files ready for the case. Constitutional rights law. For clients that couldn't pay. What had she come to. Her parents, if she were still speaking to them, would be horrified. Father Murphy, if she were still speaking to him, would be proud. If Ray were still with her he would look at her as if she were the brightest star in his universe. Not unlike how Leoben had looked at her when he was inside her in her dreams.

She visited the Cylon camp that afternoon. Crowded tents in the snow. She thought of Ray in the Arctic with his mountie boyfriend. He had told her about it when he returned, about the cold and the fear, but it couldn't have been worse than this. She thought about Ray, shivering in the Arctic cold. She thought about Leoben, with nothing but tents and a flight jacket to protect him from the Chicago winter.

Four of them greeted her, all looking exactly alike. "Which of you is Leboen?" she asked.

"We all are," one said. "But I am the one you know."

He took her by the elbow and led her through the camp. It was like a world made up of three people, two women and Leoben. There had been humans with them as well, but they had all been released. Someone else had won that case already. "You were all copied from three models?" she asked.

"Once I had brothers," Leoben said. "But surely you would understand about lost family."

He took her elbow and a shiver went through her body at his touch. He led her into his tent and made coffee for her in a pot on a small gas burner. She held the cup in her hands against the chill and he sat beside her, too close. "You understand," he said. "You were loved by a man who could never support your destiny. He taught you that love, that children, would always take you away from what you could be."

That was unfair. Ray had loved her well for many years and she wasn't going to hear him slandered by this robot. "Ray's better than that," Stella said. "What do you know about him anyway?" She kept her voice as cold as the winter air around them.

Leoben leaned in, so close she could feel his breath on her neck. "It's part of God's plan, Stella," he said. "I've seen it. God formed me in his shape to bring you to the truth of what you are."

And oh, it was tempting. She could still feel the way he had made love to her in her dreams. But there was one thing Leoben had said that was true: Ray had taught her that she wasn't going to find her destiny at the end of a man's pecker. No matter how beautiful he was. No matter how much she might want him. No matter how much he might be twisting her with his beautiful, deceptive body, so like and so unlike Ray. "I already know the truth of who I am," Stella said.

She let him walk her out to the gate. His eyes were full of knowledge, full of secrets. He took her hand. "I'll be back," she said. It felt like just as much of a promise as she wanted to make.

"I've seen it," Leoben said. "I know."

*

The next day Leoben was in her office again. He could be practical, serious, full of clever ideas for manipulating juries and judges. (More than once she had to refrain herself from suggesting law school.) And then he would stop, and let his eyes linger just a little too long. When she rose to conclude their meeting he once again took her hand and brought it to his face. "It's destiny, Stella," he said. "You can't fight it." He gestured around at the papers on her desk. "A case before the supreme court. Is that what you've always dreamed of?" And of course it was, of course that was her dream, but something in his voice made her want so much more.

"I've seen you with me," Leoben said. "I know God has sent me to you for a reason. It's part of God's plan that you love me, Stella, it's been destined. I've seen you in my arms," he let his free hand trail up her waist, "I know I can make you happier than you have ever been," he said. "I've seen it."

It did sound awfully compelling. It was even more certain than the way Ray had used to speak. "How do you know it wasn't Ray you saw me with?" she asked. "The two of you do look rather alike."

Leoben smiled, that awful, beautiful smile. "I wasn't seeing the past," he said.

When Leoben left Stella put her head on his desk and waited for her breathing to return to normal. When he had been here she hadn't even noticed it catch. The robot was getting to her. He was getting to her bad. She wondered why. He already had her signature on the contract that guaranteed that she would represent him in court, even if he couldn't pay. In any case she had taken pro bono cases before, she'd have done it without the whole seduction act. And, damnit, she wasn't _worth_ this, not in her forties and career obsessed and still in love with someone she had divorced a long time ago...

Stella picked up the phone before the thought was fully formed in her mind. Ray's telephone number was still on her speed dial, she hadn't thought to erase it even though she had only spoken to him three times since he got back from Canada six months before. "I need your help," she said, as soon as he answered.

She hadn't asked him for anything in years, but he didn't hesitate. "I'll be over right away," he said.

"No, wait," she said. "It's not a police case. There's something I need you to check out for me, off the record, if you can."

""Something to do with a deadbeat husband?" he asked.

She laughed. It was easier, she supposed, now that Ray had moved on. "It's about the Cylons," she said. "You know I took their case, right? Well, I think they're keeping something from me, and I need to know what it is."

"How the hell do you expect I will be able to help with that?" he asked. "What, do you want me to put scrap metal on my head and pretend I'm a toaster?"

"Oh, don't worry," she said, amused. "I don't expect you'll find passing to be much of a problem at all."

Ray was in her office three days later with a big purple bruise on his right eye. "I started out in the Colonial tenaments on Southside," he said, "and there was this blond chick who decked me one as soon as she saw me. Didn't give me any new information, though. None of them did. They just told me the same thing they told the news: planet destroyed, yadda yadda, alliance with Cylons, yadda yadda, Earth was their only hope, they found it together, now they're here."

"So you didn't find anything?" she asked.

"Didn't say that," he said, looking insufferably, gorgeously smug. "Don't underestimate me. You know how they say that the people who destroyed their planets - apparently there were twelve planets - all got themselves killed on their way here?"

"Yeah," she said, as Ray slid a picture to her across the desk. It was unmistakably Leoben, standing together with two of his sisters and one woman and three men she didn't recognize. In the distance bombs were falling. Bombs that they had sent.

"They're covering it up," Ray said. "The humans are helping the Cylons cover it up. But they did it. The Cylons you are representing. They're the ones who dropped the bombs. They're the ones who destroyed the Colonials' planets."

"Why would they do that?" she asked. And in any case it wasn't her business, she thought. It happened in another solar system. But then, she thought, of course it was. She was in the running to be the next state's attorney. Genocide had universal jurisdiction.

"I was wondering that myself," he said. "But when I talked to them, when they thought I was a Cylon, a lot of them acted like I was a friend, or at least an ally. Even the blond girl did, once she was done punching me. But there was this older lady, they called her their president, like they don't live in a country that already has one, anyway she said to tell my brothers and sisters that she was going to try to help us, that we're not forgotten. It was touching, sort of. Anyway, I figured I wouldn't get more answers from her, so I went to talk to the Cylons."

"Did they recognize you weren't one of them?" she asked.

"About as quickly as Ray Vecchio noticed I wasn't him. But Leoben talked to me. It was freaky as hell. He said I was still waiting for my 'singular moment of clarity'. So I asked if he uses that line on everyone, and asked him if he found his in blowing up planets. And you know what he said? He said 'I found it when I killed my brothers for the woman I love.' The Cylons who are here turned on the other Cylons and allied with the humans. That's why they trust them."

"So," Stella said, finally understanding. "Do I advocate for them as refugees or get them put away as war criminals?" It was all clear now. Leoben had never wanted her. She wasn't the woman for whom he had killed his brothers. All he had wanted from her was to overlook his past. "It's a hard choice," she said. "It would be the case of a lifetime, either way."

"Don't do it," Ray said, quickly. "It's up to the Colonials. They should get to decide."

Stella remembered the feel of Leoben's face under her hands, the way her heart and soul had twisted at his touch. She wondered if Leoben had gotten to Ray as well. "He does use that line on everyone," she said. "That line, or similar ones." She wanted to cry, wanted Ray to put his hand on her shoulder. It felt so perfect, having him here, so much better than anything with Leoben had felt. So she had to push him away. "Leoben said I was loved by a man who couldn't support my destiny."

"He was right," Ray said.

Stella looked up and stared. "What?"

"I didn't understand," Ray said, "until I was in the arctic with Ben. It was cold, and I was hungry, and he was having the best time in the world but it was just the place I didn't want to be. But it was his home, and I was his partner, so I was there with him. When you became Assistant State's Attorney, it was like I didn't understand, that was your world. I couldn't ask you to leave it. I shouldn't have expected you would have my kids and drop it all and everything would be fine. So, yeah. Destiny. I didn't. Support. Yeah."

"It sounds like Fraser is good for you. I'm glad you two are together." And in a way she was. "I'm happy for the two of you," she said.

"Yeah," Ray said. Then a moment later, "Wait, you don't think Ben and I are, like, a couple? Is that what you think? 'Cause I wouldn't think I'd need to explain my sexual orientation to the woman I've been hot for since puberty."

She didn't want to be across the desk from him any more. She got up, walked around the desk, and sat right next to him, so close their knees almost touched. His hand came to rest on the outside of her thigh, like it had any business being up her skirt. It felt wonderful. Up close she could see the lines on his face that had grown in the years since she left him. She had a sudden vision of what he would look like in ten years, and for a moment she thought she could guess, or at least hope, what it was that Leoben saw. And it was frightening, yes, as frightening as living and feeling trapped and feeling loved and letting someone else's destiny take shape alongside hers. She wanted it, though. She wanted it more than anything.

"So, um," Ray said, flustered and shy and beautiful. "Can I buy you a drink?"

"Yes," Stella said. She let his fingers find hers and intertwine, feeling crazy with the knowledge of what was possible. "It's destiny," she said.


End file.
